Page 124 of Her Feral Beasts

Sniffing, I look over at what she’s pointing to. There is a pile of items on my bed.

“I told them not to touch any of it,” Minnie says nervously.

But I can barely hear her. I can barely hear the tentative questions they’re asking, or Raquel and Connor’s discreet sniffing, because the growling in my head turns into something an inch less than rabid.

On my bed is a neatly folded set of black trackpants. On top of that is an old USB and a tiny square of red foil that once held chocolate.

Slowly, I slide to the floor, my knees suddenly weak, my very marrowburningwith something heinous.

My anima screams, and it rattles my very skull.

“Lia,” Sabrina whispers, like she can’t believe what she’s saying. “Why are the Slaughter Brothers sending you gifts?”

“Are they even gifts?” Stacey says.

“Of c-course they are,” Raquel says softly.

But my mates aren’t giving me gifts. They arereturninggifts to their regina.

“I can’t do this,” I choke out, clutching at my stomach as if I can cling onto my anima, hold her in my arms and stifle her screaming with a hug. “Oh Goddess, I can’t do this.”

I rejected my mates, quite clearly, by physically running away from them. But now, they rejected me in the most concrete way an animus could.

Traditionally, a regina or rex is the first to gift something to the members of their pack. It’s a sort of claiming, and even without knowing, I gave these gifts to them. The fact that they kept them all this time, and were now returning them…

I sucked in a breath through a constricted throat and I sounded like I was dying.

“Oh, Goddess!” Minnie rushes over to me. “Calm down, Lia. Calm the fuck down. Breathe. Breathe!”

Henry smacks his entire body into my cheek and I’m so shocked by the sudden pain that I do take a full, unrestricted breath. I stare at him in shock, but his inky black eyes are angry on me. He squawks forcefully with his whole body.

“He said that with his whole chest, too,” Connor says. “Listen to Henry, Lia.”

The nimpins squeak in agreement.

“Fuck,” I sob. “Fuck!”

“What’s going on, guys?” Stacey asks frantically.

“I-It’s obvious, isn’t it?” Raquel says behind me.

“It’s not possible,” Stacey says, and it sounds muffled, like she’s covering her mouth. “The lockdown starts tomorrow, so she must be a little riled up! It has to be that.”

“That’s not it,” Connor says quietly. “No fucking way.”

Minnie comes to my rescue. “Look, guys. Whatever the truth is doesn’t matter anymore. We’ve only got a few hours left.”

“You’re r-right,” Raquel grunts. “We n-need to be c-clear-headed.”

I hold Henry to my chest to try and reassure him that I’m not completely losing it.

But the thrashing and snarling inside my body tells me otherwise

“Itisa mess,” I whisper.

The room is silent as they all stare listlessly at me, no doubt coming to a conclusion in their minds about what this means.

“What do you want to do, Lia?” Sabrina asks, smoothing my hair down. “Want me to do your hair?”

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